Is ethics about happiness? Aristotle thought so and for centuries Christians agreed, until utilitarianism raised worries about where this would lead. In this volume, Peter Singer, leading utilitarian philosopher and controversial defender of infanticide and euthanasia, addresses this question in conversation with Christian ethicists and secular utilitarians. Their engagement reveals surprising points of agreement and difference on questions of moral theory, the history of ethics, and current issues such as climate change, abortion, poverty and animal rights. The volume explores the advantages and pitfalls of basing morality on happiness; if ethics is teleological, is its proper aim the subjective satisfaction of preferences? Or is human flourishing found in objective goods: friendship, intellectual curiosity, meaningful labour? This volume provides a timely review of how utilitarians and Christians conceive of the good, and will be of great interest to those studying religious ethics, philosophy of religion and applied ethics.

This volume offers innovative approaches to the study of religion. It brings together junior and senior scholars from the Global North and South. The contributors also explore the context-specific formations of religion and religious knowledge production in an increasingly instable and incalculable, globalized world. In the spirit of the challenging slogan, "Religion in Motion. Rethinking Religion, Knowledge and Discourse in a Globalizing World," the book bundles voices from a great variety of cultural and academic backgrounds. It offers readers a cross-continental exchange of innovative approaches in the study of religion. Coverage intersects religion, gender, economics, and politics. In addition, it de-centers European perspectives and brings in perspectives from the Global South. Chapters examine such topics as feminine power and agency in the Ile Axe Oxum Abalo , queering the Trinity, and faith and professionalism in humanitarian encounters in post-earthquake Haiti. Coverage also explores notions of development in African initiated churches and their implications for development policy, the study of religion as the study of discourse construction, rethinking the religion/secularism binary in world politics, and more. This book will appeal to students and researchers with an interest in Religion and Society, Philosophy and Religion, and Religion and Gender.

This classic of Christian autobiography John Bunyan is timeless in its wisdom, wherein the author wrestles with his convictions of belief in the divine. For centuries a leading source on the Puritanical movement and its adherents, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners remains a regularly consulted text by theologians, religious historians and the general reader. The title itself is a composite reference to two famous Biblical passages: Romans 5:20 and Timothy 1:15. As well as discussing the process through which he found his Christian faith, Bunyan is forthright about the personal struggles he had with belief. Hardship was a reality for Bunyan, who drafted this book while incarcerated for preaching without a proper license. For Bunyan the possibility of salvation by the Lord was a constant preoccupation, and a motivation for authoring multiple works on faith and leading the life he led.

The book works out new perspectives for a philosophy of religion that aims beyond the internal questions of rationality within a theological tradition, on the one hand, and the outer criticism of religion from naturalistic quaters, on the other. Instead it places itself within a wider philosophical view in line with groundbreaking thoughts about culture and a basic human 'conditionality' among interwar philosophers such as Ernst Cassirer, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Walter Benjamin, and Martin Heidegger. The book also offers a concrete interpretation of examples of religious phenomena displaying a human world-relation that centers on issues of 'truth', 'name', and 'habitation'. Finally, lines are drawn to Jean-Luc Nancy's current rethinking of Christianity.

A classic work of religious philosophy, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion is Scottish philosopher David Hume's famous examination of the nature of God. Hume asks the question as to whether or not man's belief in God can be supported by experience. The subject is discussed between three philosophers named Demea, Philo and Cleanthes. While all three agree that a god exists, they differ sharply in opinion on God's nature and how, or if, humankind can come to knowledge of a deity.

Northern Ireland presents a fundamental challenge for the sociology of religion - how do religious beliefs, attitudes and identities relate to practices, violence and conflict? In other words, what does religion do? These interrogations are at the core of this book. It is the first critical and comprehensive review of the ways in which the social sciences have interpreted religion's significance in Northern Ireland. In particular, it examines the shortcomings of existing interpretations and, in turn, suggests alternative lines of thinking for more robust and compelling analyses of the role(s) religion might play in Northern Irish culture and politics. Through, and beyond, the case of Northern Ireland, the second objective of this book is to outline a critical agenda for the social study of religion, which has theoretical and methodological underpinnings. Finally, this work engages with epistemological issues which never have been addressed as such in the Northern Irish context: how do conflict settings affect the research undertaken on religion, when religion is an object of political and violent contentions? By analysing the scope for objective and critical thinking in such research context, this critical essay intends to contribute to a sociology of the sociology of religion.

What would you do if you only had only thirty days to live? What if that time was shortened to twenty-four hours-or even one hour?

You can't control the amount of time you have left, but you can control how you spend that time. Timothy J. Brill, a pilot, philosopher, and adventure seeker, examines the nature of existence and humanity in a series of essays, considering how you can prevent fear from dominating your life, avoid being a victim by seeking answers, recognize the detrimental nature of feelings of entitlement, and stand up for what is right.

We live in a world of increasing isolation, self-delusion and hatred, where any moral voice is labeled as a freak. We only live an illusion of freedom, and we need a new worldview that promotes the dignity of every person and all of creation.

Join Tim as he explores how to create this new worldview with a spirit of charity, love, and, most importantly, a whole new attitude.

Are science and religion in accord or are they diametrically opposed to each other? The common perspectives-for or against religion-are based on the same question, "Do religion and science fit together or not?" These arguments are usually stuck within a preconceived notion of realism which assumes that there is a 'true reality' that is independent of us and is that which we discover. However, this context confuses our understanding of both science and religion. The core concern is not the relation between science and religion, it is realism in science and religion. Wittgenstein's philosophy and developments in quantum theory can help us to untie the knots in our preconceived realism and, as Wittgenstein would say, show the fly out of the bottle. This point of view changes the discussion from science and religion competing for the discovery of the 'true reality' external to us (realism), and from claiming that reality is simply whatever we pragmatically think it is (nonrealism), to realizing the nature and interdependence of reality, language, and information in science and religion.

This book brings together the study of two great disciplines of the Islamic world: law and philosophy. In both sunni and shiite Islam, it became the norm for scholars to acquire a high level of expertise in the legal tradition. Thus some of the greatest names in the history of Aristotelianism were trained jurists, like Averroes, or commented on the status and nature of law, like al-Farabi. While such authors sought to put law in its place relative to the philosophical disciplines, others criticized philosophy from a legal viewpoint, like al-Ghazali and Ibn Taymiyya. But this collection of papers does not only explore the relative standing of law and philosophy. It also looks at how philosophers, theologians, and jurists answered philosophical questions that arise from jurisprudence itself. What is the logical structure of a well-formed legal argument? What standard of certainty needs to be attained in passing down judgments, and how is that standard reached? What are the sources of valid legal judgment and what makes these sources authoritative? May a believer be excused on grounds of ignorance? Together the contributions provide an unprecedented demonstration of the close connections between philosophy and law in Islamic society, while also highlighting the philosophical interest of texts normally studied only by legal historians.